Leading Social Strategy In The Legal Industry

What Lawyers Should Know about Social Media

July 6, 2010

Are you using linkedin, twitter, facebook, and blogging for your business?

I’ve been blogging at http://HRMargo.com for a year now, and I’ve learned a lot about blogging, and social media. I just started this blog last week, and while this is a new blog, I am very savvy when it comes to helping lawyers build their online brand. I’ve been on the web since 1994. As an early adopter of internet technology, I have learned the importance of an building an effective an online brand. As lawyers, you already know the some of the pitfalls of social networking. What I’ve discovered in the past year is that most of my legal clients are not online. I can’t tell you how many lawyers I’ve talked to who said they don’t have a blog, twitter account, a facebook page, or a linkedin profile. If they do have linkedin profiles, they are incomplete, or not search engine optimized. I selected the above photo because it reminded me of a law library. Lawyers are comfortable with books. Think about social media as your online library.

What follows are my top 5 tips for a successful blog and linkedin profile.

Make sure your profile is 100% complete, upload a picture. Think about your story, and promote what you can do for your clients.

Load it with industry relevant key words so that you show up in search results.

Key your content fresh by updating it often. Updating your profile, and blog will help you pop up in searches. People need to have a reason to come back to your website, blog, and profile. If you are not updating it, there’s nothing new to see. The more click-throughs you receive, the greater your chances are for attracting new clients.

Rather than advertising directly, your blog, website, and linkedin profile will draw people to you. Indirect/inbound marketing is a powerful thing. Instead of “push,” it’s “pull,” and if leveraged properly, it can drastically reduce your marketing budget. The point is all your social media sites should be embedded with key words, tagged, and up to date with information.

LinkedIn, facebook, twitter, and new media can be powerful tools, but they are useless if you are not completing all the steps to make your social media endeavor viable. I am not a lawyer, but I work for and with lawyers. I can tell you this much, the more you know, the more there is to learn. The technology changes at rapid speed. Don’t let fear keep you from jumping in the digital water. It’s difficult to decide where you should invest your time, and financial resources. I’ve seen clients waste both time and money by getting bad advice, or not following through on the advice they’ve been given. I hope this post gives you food for thought.